Greenland
Velkommen til Grønland! As the intro says in the native tongue, welcome to Greenland! A low complexity map, Greenland is great for quick games with both experienced and inexperienced players alike. This map features 3 regions that are starting neutrals (the passes across the ice cap). The neutral regions start with 2 neutral troops and are used to connect the eastern and western parts of the map. Be warned though, once conquered, the 3 passes (starting neutrals) impose a 1 troop decay at the beginning of your turn, causing 1 troop to be deducted from that region (but always leaving at least 1 troop). Bonuses Settings Manual deployment The possibilities with manual settings are endless, and that's for any map! However, if we take a focus on Greenland, we can notice some benefits and detriments to playing manual. Due to the small size of the map (please see Classification), manual can be tricky. You have to position yourself just right to be able to get a hold of a bonus. Yes, that's right - in manual you deploy and go for a bonus, this way you can still have a stack of your troops to protect it. When deploying, be sure to think of your opponent's drop. Don't drop your troops into a place where your opponent may be right next door; such spots can be places where they are taking a bonus or key bottlenecks. If your opponent goes first and attacks your stack, he'll probably win and it's just game over after that. Take this into consideration as much as possible, and use your best judgement to determine where he may end up. Nuclear Just like most other nuclear games, choosing this setting will probably end up with you having multiple regions with one troop, and an army of neutrals between you and your opponent(s). Nuclear has some impact on this game, and this is because of the medium-small size of the map. Let me give an example: Suppose you had a 6 player game, and everyone cashed their 3 cards right after the other, this would mean that 18 regions would be nuked, that's literally half the map all in nukes! However, on a larger map such as WWII Europe, it's barely able to affect the game. However, if you are using manual settings, nuclear spoils may not be a good option because you might have to turn in spoils that one of your troop-stacks is sitting on, or someone else will. Note: You can still play with manual and nuclear settings in tandem, but remember to diversify your troops onto multiple regions to avoid the previous. Escalating Positioning When starting on Greenland, if you don't already own at least one end of an ice path, get one. If you are on a territory that borders an ice path, build up on at least one, but I suggest no more than 2. This is because you can access many parts of the map by going through each ice path. If for some reason you can not hold part of an ice path, try to at least have Qaanaq and/or Nuuk. These two regions connect the Northern and Southern regions of the map, and can be used for increased mobility as well. Playing While playing games on Greenland with escalating spoils , I came to realize that given the small size of the map, that the traditional idea of eliminating a player for spoils and turning in, etc., can happen fairly quickly given the low number of starting regions. With a lower initial troop count, this makes cashing early a possible advantage as 4 or 6 extra troops could really make a difference. For Greenland, escalating is a balanced spoils type. The strategy plays as a standard map until it is time to try and eliminate someone. Dead Ends: Nanortalik (South), Nares Land (North) Bottlenecks: *Paamiut (above Nanortalik) *Gunnbjord Fjeld *Maniltsoq *Upernavik *Nuusuaq *All ice paths Large games 7+ I would not suggest large games on Greenland due to its layout and low number of starting regions (see my chart of players and starting regions above). This could create many starting positions that aren't fun and may make you feel like the game is stagnant at the beginning of round one. Fog With as many regions that are adjacent to others, I would nominate fog as a good setting for escalating spoils. Terminator With as many regions that are adjacent to others, I would nominate fog as a good setting for escalating spoils. Flat rate and no spoils No spoils is better on this map compared to both escalating and flat rate. Flat rate spoils, on a first cash, can nearly decide who wins the game. An extra 10 potential troops by Round 4 would be a horribly lucky advantage. The size of the map isn't prepared to handle so many troops being pumped onto it quite so soon. Assassin Greenland assassin is typical assassin! Be sure to have maneuverability around the map so that you can strike when the time is right. As mentioned previously, the ice passes are important to this map, and this holds true for assassin. Keep some passes, or the border regions to the passes, available to allow you quick access to all parts of the map. 1v1 This is a wonderful 1v1 map. With each player starting with only 11 initial regions, you do not have to take another player's region to lower their region bonus, but can instead choose to sit and build, or choose to try to conquer and hold another region to increase your own region bonus. This helps to negate the advantage of the player that goes first to decrease the second player's deployment. If you don't know whether you should build or not, that's ok. Choosing to either build up and wait or conquer another region for the hopes of holding 12 regions for a region bonus of 4 troops depends on your style of play. Build, and try not to count on luck, but do whatever suits your long term strategy best. Fog on this map adds a great element to the strategy; this is because of the positioning and presence of the ice paths. The ice paths allow you to build up behind a neutral front and launch an unsuspected assault onto an opponent you may know is on the other side of the map. When playing 1v1 on this map, fog also is great because of how narrow the bonus zones are. The reason is that you and your opponent may be, for the most part, split among neutrals. This is great due to the fact that you can build in an unknown place for a time before major assaulting ensues. However, given the size of the map, building won't last too long. Remember, with only 35 regions, Greenland is less than double the region count of Doodle Earth (18 regions) and that someone may strike quickly for another player instead of building up until high card cashes. So fog is a definite yes for me. Team games Teams, teams, teams - the games that everyone loves, but how are these games on Greenland, you ask? Well let's take a look ~ To start off, in any team game you usually fall into or around Peary Land. From my experience on this map, Peary Land on Greenland is comparable to Oceania on the Classic map. The beginning team to hold this bonus may usually lead the game at the start, which is important to gameplay. Also, it is important to note that Maara borders one of the ever important ice paths. If you are, however, unable to acquire this bonus, the second best option is Qeqqata. This bonus zone only has two border regions, one of which borders an ice pass. The strategy for this map is standard team gameplay for the most part, and any team size will work for this map (although, if you don't like everyone working with small numbers, I would advise against Quadruples).